Subscribe to RSSAuck To Get Bike Rental For RWC
As tipped here recently, Auckland will get a trial bike rental scheme in time for the RWC 2011, with the plan for it to become more permanent and be extended to more suburbs after the tournament is over.
Auckland Transport has called for expressions of interest from organisations interested in running such a business and a shortlist will be drawn up and then used as part of a planned future competitive tendering process.
Since the demise of the Nextbikes scheme, Auckland Council and Auckland Transport have each already considered proposals for, and adopted resolutions in support of further investigating a public bike hire scheme for Auckland.
In its document inviting expressions of interest, Auckland Transport says:
“Experience locally and elsewhere suggests a reliance on some form of on-street or on-bike sponsorship revenue to support public bike hire schemes. In some cases this is also in combination with public funding. AT will consider the case for public funding and any budgetary implications at a later stage of this procurement process.
“It should go without saying that schemes that maximize the public benefit in terms of service provided (in this case number of cycles, cycle stations etc) and limit the call on public funds, will be looked on more favourably than the converse.”
Auckland Transport says it’s looking to partner with an operator in a way that delivers a “successful and long term public bike hire scheme but the nature of such a partnering arrangement “has still to be defined and quantified.”
The body emphasises that whoever gets to run the trial has to demonstrate it could develop a business model that could be sustained over a longer term. This would include confirmation and confidence that a commercial operator has access to capital and revenue sources to implement, maintain, manage, market and develop a successful scheme over the longer term and those submitting addressing what will become the contentious issue - whether the scheme can be operated on a fully commercial basis or would be dependent upon some level of public funding.
From here in Brisbane, I posted how that city’s new bike rental scheme looks good - but it still finding its way in terms of customers and depends on the support and enthusiasm of the local council - something that even in Brisbane may be needed for a long term or forever in terms of funding requirements.
The Brisbane scheme is used -but by not enough people
Auckland Transport would like proposals that extend the benefits and advantages of a scheme beyond the CBD to include other district centres, hospitals, major employment sites, public transport interchanges, tertiary educational institutions and recreational centres.
Again, it worries me that the Auckland disease of being half-hearted (as shown by the limited waterfront tram route) is rearing its head again.
It is a hard ask for any business to go to the expense of setting up a bike rental scheme for the RWC and not have a guarantee of what will happen after that. It may only be Nextbike that has the ability to resurrect its old scheme to do that. Assuming Nextbike still has its bikes,etc lying around, it may be that Nextbike is the only group that throws its hat in the ring as who else wants to go to this expense just for the RWC? The funding aspect especially any commitment to public funding is still very fuzzy and it’s hard for any organisation to promise it can run the scheme itself as a commercial operation.
In November, Nextbike announced: “After 3 years of running the operation, as an advertiser funded service, we’ve come to a point where we can no longer sustain the business in its current format.” Nextbike had 2500 members, up from almost 900 in October 2009 and was operating from 55 locations around Auckland. Over 50% of all Nextbike rides were unpaid as short trips. Over 85% of customers were from Auckland. But Nextbike said it could not make it work with the old Auckland council attitudes on funding and the number of bikes and placement of racks issue. Nextbike had put forward four scenarios to the council before it had to call it quits.
Earlier, it had asked for 250 bike racks to be made available for Nextbike to operate from in the central suburbs (CBD,Parnell, Newmarket, Mt Eden, Kingsland, Ponsonby) warning:
“Without permission to expand, and without additional official locations to operate from, Nextbike will operate at a loss for 2010 – 2011. This a position that the shareholders (who have invested $570k over 4 years) can no longer tolerate. All the knowledge and skills are in place for Nextbike to run a financially sustainable public private partnership.
“This will require a supportive operating environment from Auckland City Council and a relatively small capital investment, in comparison to the investment to date from Nextbike, to meet the opportunities.”
More facts and figures on the Nextbike experience are here
This should be a no-brainer.
It’s not just Brisbane. 201 cities around the world are known to now have street public bikes systems. They encourage an alternative transport and a healthy one. It’s what the stupid old Herald didn’t get with its argument that we don’t need trains when we have buses. We need numerous alternatives to cars. We don’t all use just one form. I walk, cycle, catch buses, trains and drive!
We need a clear bold plan of adopting a bike rental plan like Brisbane and sorting out funding now with a commitment of years, not months. If cities like Brisbane are still struggling in the present global business climate to get advertising to pay for the bikes and public funds are needed, there should be no illusion that once the RWC visitors have gone, any such bike rental scheme will struggle.
So let’s get some vision of a bike-friendly city with a workable bike rental scheme that acknowledges it will need a financial partnership with local government to survive.
Doing a temporary or “trial” scheme for the RWC is a bit of a con, giving visitors the impression that Auckland is like the other 201 cities they may come from and that we also have a bike rental scheme. Use of the bikes will of course be inflated by the number of visitors and give no indication how it could work long-term for Auckland. We already know from the Nextbike experience, it will be a struggle.
We need to commit long-term and do it properly.
Auckland Transport will announce its shortlist on February 25.
I’m not knocking the move to try to do something as Auckland Transport’s thinking in encouraging cycling in such a way is certainly in line with what we would expect and have expected it to inherit from the ARC etc.
Of course, with cycling generally in Auckland, there is still a lot to be done.
Auckland Transport, Auckland Council and the New Zealand Transport Agency have deliverd approximately 25% of the regional cycle network covering approximately 238km. This consists of a mixture of off and on road routes.
The estimated combined spend of these works over the three year period from 2009 – 2012 is NZ $36m (excluding cycle facilities provided as part of other transport projects such as road corridor improvements). A map of the regional cycle network in Auckland CBD is shown below.
On a side issue of advertising and sponsorship the document mentions that the contract for bus shelter advertising with Adshel that Auckland Transport inherited exists until 2023! How did that happen!
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“On a side issue of advertising and sponsorship the document mentions that the contract for bus shelter advertising with Adshel that Auckland Transport inherited exists until 2023! How did that happen!”
Because people like Rodney Hide think it’s good value for money to lock us into contracts that have decades to run before being able to be renegotiated. Soon, your water utility can be outsourced for 30 years!
Regarding the NextBike experience - I understand your concerns Jon regarding “half-hearted” measures. And I also understand your concerns re the limitations of NextBike’s systems (though I don’t really agree with you - I used the system maybe twice monthly during it’s time of operation, despite having a bike in the CBD already, and it was quite practical).
Where I am leading to is that NextBike’s expenses and operating costs were, according to their staff that I talked to, mere pennies compared to overseas systems. So if we don’t have the cash or the vision to go all-out for a more expensive system, we dont HAVE to, and can still get a working system for essentially pocket change.
Anyway, thanks for posting this, and I hope something comes from the Council tender.
[...] This post was mentioned on Twitter by Peter, George Williams. George Williams said: Longer term needed RT @kaupapa: Auckland to get bike rental scheme for RWC but no longer-term commitment http://bit.ly/hfHgBs @AKTtweets [...]
@ingolfson Ashel was negotiated with the old councils in 2000 so it wasn’t anything to do with Rodney. AT just inherits it.
They need to get the helmet law repealed for it to work.
I would use a hire bike but not if I have to carry a helmet round with me. I dont fancy using a cruddy helmet used by numerous other hirers as an option either. (Plus you cant just plop any helmet on it has to fit!)
Bike parking and change rooms at the stadiums would not hurt too.
Jon C - I said people “like Rodney Hide”, and in any case, this is right up his alley. Also, he was in politics in the 2000s, probably for the same brand of policies, wasn’t he?
Richard - a plastic/synthetic materials (!) helmet out being weathered in the sun and rain is no more unsanitary (probably more sanitary!) that the doorhandle to your public or office restroom or shared computer keyboard. Plus, the Nextbike helmets were regularly cleaned and sprayed as I understand, so probably again, more than most public items get.
However, I do understand your reluctance on a psychological basis, and fully support a helmet law repeal anyway. Not going to happen soon, though. Maybe the new provider needs to go all the way and provide vending machines for disposable helmets like Melbourne is now doing, but that would probably be too expensive for our Council/NZTA’s liking - especially as it would be needed at lots and lots of stations.
As for “fitting” - the NextBike helmets were fully size adjustable with a extendable headband and chinband, so no problem at all.
LarryH - yes, tell that to the stadium owners. When Cycle Action Auckland argued for cycle lockers and similar facilities at Eden park (which also has hundreds of staff and a 2000 people convention centre), they scoffed at us, and basically said there’s no need for that. They promised to put in a few bike stands, still need to check if they did.
CAA had more success at the Marine Events Centre on the viaduct, where they agreed to add bike parks for public and shower/locker facilities for staff.
It could and should be a national scheme, and it could work in many places. It doesn’t just have to be the Auckland CBD. And fully integrate the scheme with Auckland’s smartcard, and replace all the different smartcards in NZ with one single smartcard. (Horizons Regional Council even has it’s own smartcard!!) And get rid of the helmet laws. Then getting off any train or plane in the country you’re already set to go. Fly up to Auckland, hire a bike, ride to Onehunga, catch the train, get off at Britomart. Catch the ferry to Devonport. Ride to Takapuna. Do that in reverse. Fly to Queenstown. Get a shared bike at Frankton airport. Ride along the lakefront. Get a hotel in the Queenstown CBD.
Catch a bus to Dunedin. Ride to Port Chalmers. Catch the train to Christchurch (pretending it was still running). There’d be bikes to ride around Hagley Park, and out to the airport. Take a small amount of stuff in a daypack. It’s non-motorised mobility.
A national scheme obviously needs a brainy policy boffin in the Beehive. No chance of it ever happening then, hey?
@richard: Buy a helmet, I’m happy not to have to pay with my taxes to put your brains back inside your head if you come off your bike.
@Doloras,
A wider reading on bike helmets will show you there is more cost to society of having the helmet law than not, and mandatory helmet laws are mostly counterproductive. There is probably a more compelling case to make motorists wear helmets than cyclists. Cycling safety should be improved by methods that work such as better separated infrastructure, and not by the bad science of the helmet brigade.
This is a business - where’s the customer research? who will use it?
I’m concerned about the build it and they’ll come approach - especially when obviously they didn’t!
the locations they expanded to in Kingsland/Mt Eden, really had no research that they were wanted or would be used - and they weren’t.
If the market is tourists - then yes CBD -Tamaki Dr may well work - but are those tourists going to cycle up queen st/mt Eden road? and what for?
Are they going to cycle to Ponsonby? they can just jump on train or a link bus. Auckland isn’t a large flat CBD for tourists to cycle.
If it’s local users - again where is the research - NZ already has a very high bike owning population.
before public money or space is invested these need to be answered. having racks may seem good - but when 80-100% occupied for 2 rentals a month, it has a large public space cost. In Mt Eden, the introduced rack, stopped school kids chaining up there bikes.
Personally I’d much rather see cycling integrated better to train stations - thereby doubling/trebling those in easy access. I suspect an investment in secure cycle racks at rail stations would benefit both local (safe) cycling to stations, and help with rail patronage - far more than a rental cycle scheme.
Mark, why pay market research consultants big heaps of money for a study (do we really need MORE studies, rather than action?) when the same amount of money along could have kept NextBike up for another year or two?
Next you argue that NextBike failed in attracting customers - saying “especially when obviously they didn’t!”
NextBike didn’t quite make enough money to survive as a purely commercial business limited by strict restrictions of Council, but provided a great service. Used by over 2000 users monthly, if I remember the numbers right, and that on a shoestring budget which left no ability to market itself to users.
Under the “did not have enough users to pay its way” argument, we should close all the trains and buses right now, because they aren’t running with 100% farebox recovery.
Your argument that NextBike blocked other users is also pretty spurious in my view - every use blocks some other use. The telephone booth on the footpath, the sandwich board from that shop, the parking space that somebody else is using, the loading space which I never get to use in my private car, the bus stop where I may not park - all these have limitations on who, when is allowed to use it.
You make it sound like NextBike, by using up a few racks here and there (they had 170 bikes only!) did cycling a disservice in Auckland. Are you aware that quite a few racks were installed only BECAUSE of NextBike by Council, and their lobbying for more bike parking, supported by Cycle Action Auckland and some of the more progressive Councillors?
I don’t disagree with your proposed improvements to train station cycling access. But I am disappointed that some people apparently think that it’s a zero-sum game, and supporting a public bike scheme is somehow going to hurt this city, or even more strangely, hurt cycling.
“the bad science of the helmet brigade”
A useful rule of thumb is that anyone who accuses people who disagree with them of being a “brigade” (eg “the PC brigade”) is an entrenched partisan on whom rational argument will not work.
@Doloras
Tell that to the fire brigade.
Here’s a good place to start:
http://www.copenhagenize.com/2008/03/bicycle-helmet-articles-cykelhjelm.html
It’s interesting that the helmet debate is more like a helmet war as soon as you talk about it longer than 2 minutes. I really wonder why.
“@richard: Buy a helmet, I’m happy not to have to pay with my taxes to put your brains back inside your head if you come off your bike.”
Doloras, what about the costs to society of discouraging exercise? Looking only at ACC costs may well be too narrow a view . But since ACC only looks at injuries, not at societal health, from their perpective they are perfectly justified in discouraging cycling without helmets, even if it discourages cycling itself. Their accounts benefit.
However, if you take that logic to its extreme, ACC should also forbid (or exempt from the scheme) such high risk sports as amateur rugby. Which ACC statistics show have several times higher injury rates and ACC payouts per person per year involved in the sport than cycling WITH helmets.
I could well ask: Why should my tax money go towards paying for healthcare people who run full tilt into other people in a sport which is essentially a ritualised brawl?
[Full disclosure - I support the "no questions asked" approach of NZ's ACC system. But we need to look at the unintended consequences of our laws, especially when we insist on being one of the very, very few countries worldwide to have that particular type of law].
Doloras, I think your comments about buying a helmet and brains coming out of my head were totally unwarranted and uninformed.
I do not criticise cyclists who want to wear helmets. I dont like wearing any form of hat and have owned about six plastic helmets since 1994 and regularly use one cycling because it is law.
In 1987 before the law I was hit by a house on the back of a truck and thrown face first into a culvert. My brains didn’t come out but I lost half my face. I cracked a bone in my neck and am sure if I had a helmet on it would have grabbed and the extra force caused more serious neck injuries.
Over the years I have fallen from bikes racing dozens of times. I have evidence you are more likely to hit your head wearing a helmet than without and it is my opinion that whilst they may help in some cases they are not the safety panacea the law and many others seem to make out.
Why are you not allowed to use cycle helmets on motorcycles if they are so effective?
I cracked a bone in my neck and am sure if I had a helmet on it would have grabbed and the extra force caused more serious neck injuries.
[...] I have evidence you are more likely to hit your head wearing a helmet than without and it is my opinion that whilst they may help in some cases they are not the safety panacea the law and many others seem to make out.
And it is my opinion that both of the above are prejudices without evidence. Generally, the “anti-helmet brigade” (see what I did there?) seem to be the cycle equivalent of Jeremy Clarkson, outraged at the idea that they aren’t allowed to do whatever they want all the time. Helmets mean that if you hit your head your brains won’t splatter. My taxes pay for splattered brain. Wear your helmet and save the public health system monehy.
ingolfson - I’d be interested in who you think will use it. As I said I can understand tourists. And in a flat CBD location, I can even understand office workers moving around.
the racks out in the suburbs had basically no use at all. they were there generating advertising.
the point on imapcting other uses is a real one. Your examples miss the point - it’s cycling impacting cycling. Using your bus stop example - it’s like saying one bus company only can use a particular stop.
The concept sold for Kingsland/Dominion Rd/Mt Eden was that tourists would come out - use ther racks, stay a few hours in the area and go back to cbd - they didn’t.
Locals - who have their own bikes didn’t need them. And they weren’t going to walk to the town centre bike somewhere / and bike back.
So it’s not about lot’s of research -it’s just really basic stuff.
It is a zero sum game in many ways - the money for this will come from somewhere - and there are competing priorities. So what’s the objective? is it to reduce cars/congestion? in which case rail stations/racks would give a far far greater result.
Dolores you obviously didn’t read what I said and I feel you have an unfortunate attitude problem.
Yep,
with the world cup being played in late winter/early spring, of which is generally our most unsettled time of the year as far as rain fall goes.
I find it hard to believe that hundreds of people are going to line up and ride their bikes in the pouring rain. It is just not going to happen.
Auckland is just too wide spread for it to be effective.
Keep in mind that most of the games during the rugby world cup will be played in the evening, - can’t see to many people riding home in the dark.
So you will need to buy a helmet , lights and reflective gear……
Take the train, the bus or drive a car …
A lot of thought went into this idea.
“ingolfson – I’d be interested in who you think will use it. As I said I can understand tourists. And in a flat CBD location, I can even understand office workers moving around.”
Mark, the fact is that about upwards of two-thirds of the NextBike users were Aucklanders, with a good remaining chunk other Kiwis. I think only 10% were foreign tourists.
I also disagree with your comment about suburban racks being unused. Maybe less used, but then again, a car sits unmoving in a car park 22-23 hours a day, does that make it unused? Just because 95-99% of the time you saw them, NextBikes were chained up instead of being ridden doesn’t mean the service was unused.
Yes, the suburban stands would have worked better if there had been a greater network of OTHER suburban bike stands to link to. But NextBike was being hamstrung by the old Council in expanding further, so can you fault them for using only the locations where they got agreement from by Council and the local business associations? Rock and hard place.
“Locals – who have their own bikes didn’t need them. And they weren’t going to walk to the town centre bike somewhere / and bike back.”
You are missing the one-way use, and the convenience of being able to grab a bike from right next to you when you didn’t EXPECT to need a bike.
I used them all the time for that, and I own two bikes that I keep IN the CBD. I think you seem to miss the point of a public bike hire scheme. The Paris or London schemes are not used primarily by tourists either.
As for cycling impacting cycling, I will tell you again that due to NextBike, Auckland has gained cycle racks overall which were not there before, and Auckland Transport now has several hundreds of thousands of dollars (400,000 dollars I believe) more in their budget for racks as a result of Auckland City being pressured into providing more as a result of the NextBike debate.
I think it is sad that cyclists should fight over scraps. Motorists have tens of thousands of publicly funded on-street and public car parks and District Plan mandated off-street car parks available to them (I think the figure was 40,000 car parks in the CBD total alone), and they are laughing at us that we argue amongst ourselves about the effect that a bare 170 rental bikes had on bike parking availability. Divide and conquer indeed.
“I find it hard to believe that hundreds of people are going to line up and ride their bikes in the pouring rain. It is just not going to happen.”
Eh, just cancel the games then. I believe they are outoors too.
JC - the public bike hire scheme is NOT for the Rugby World Cup, this is just a gimmick / a way of getting things moving which could otherwise stall in committees forever. This scheme is for Aucklanders. And the tourists that are to use the scheme during the Rugby World are not to use it to get TO the games. They are to use it to see our city, ride to Mission Bay, etc… the games only happen during a very small part of their time here!
Sorry two comments above, I guess I should have elaborated “one way use from point to point” - I.e. I end up in the city, having walked or bussed there (or driven, or BEEN driven by somebody else, a big chunk of people do that), and then use a one-way rental bike to cycle somewhere else in the CBD I need to go to, and then I walk or bus back to the suburbs (or use the rental bike if there’s a suburban drop-off station, why not? Auckland is getting easier to cycle around).
It’s about flexibility. It’s about making our city easier to get around, rather than being fixed to one single mode of transport (whether it’s a car tied to available parking spots, or a bus/train tied to a single route). Works like a charm. People should try it - whoops, they can’t, because unlike London and Paris and so on, we don’t have a scheme anymore.
Sorry two comments above, I guess I should have elaborated “one way use from point to point” - I.e. I end up in the city, having walked or bussed there (or driven, or BEEN driven by somebody else, a big chunk of people do that), and then use a one-way rental bike to cycle somewhere else in the CBD I need to go to, and then I walk or bus back to the suburbs (or use the rental bike if there’s a suburban drop-off station, why not? Auckland is getting easier to cycle around).
It’s about flexibility. It’s about making our city easier to get around, rather than being fixed to one single mode of transport (whether it’s a car tied to available parking spots, or a bus/train tied to a single route). Works like a charm. People should try it - whoops, they can’t, because unlike London and Paris and so on, we don’t have a scheme anymore.
ingolfson - I see the point to point issue - but at the edn of the day - the business case only had 1-2 bike uses per month! and they still failed.
not sure the car park arguement is a good one - for Council’s these are just a revenue source - next they’re be charging for bike rack time:)
Paris just went broke as well didn’t it?
Again - it’s a nice idea, but will it actually work, and is it the best spend for the money? again I go back to proper secure racks at rail stations as top priority. that has a double win - better cycle use and supports rail. I know 1 kid had his bike stolen 3 times in 6 months at Kingsland station - parents now drive him to school… (was 800-900m from station).
ingolfson,
Sorry mate it is a dumb idea.
Visitors dont give a toss about riding a bike to see the city, yes some may ride around the water front and a few around wood hill forrest, but thats it.
Unless you are going to build bike only roads, it will not take off, as car users in Auckland will not make way for bike users on the roads.
When you come to Auckland as a visitor, what do you want to do? - most want to spend time on the habour, go watch the All Blacks, the Blues or the Warriors, go to the Cricket, the Tennis, a Concert at Vector, hit the pubs and clubs and the neightbourhood cafes.
I have never heard one visitor ask about where they can hire a bike to ride throughout the city
Mark, most of my counter-comments stemmed from the fact that I was one of the actual users of the system, and thus can say that the wide majority of the complaints people have about the system just don’t actually feel real when you ARE using it. I think the system worked, and was simply hampered by an environment that was hostile to it - Ken Baguely comes to mind - and an inability to expand and market itself the way it needed to do to take off more.
Paris went broke? You mean more money had to be invested to keep it going after significant vandalism of the bikes? Yes, that’s true, and with more visibility of a scheme here, that might be more of a problem here too - but vandalism is not really limited to bikes.
> Again – it’s a nice idea, but will it actually work,
> and is it the best spend for the money?
It HAS already worked, that’s what I am arguing. NextBike had above-average uptake rates when compared against overseas systems, and is way more used than, for example, Melbourne’s gold-plated system. Best use for money? We don’t even know how much Council is going to spend on it. NextBike at the state it was before they closed, from my discussions with the provider, probably could have been kept going for a hundred grand a year (my estimate/guess only). That is pocket change for a city with 1.6 billion a year in transport rates.
As for more secure bike racks at stations - again, I argue this is not a zero sum game, and we should not approach it that way. We are in an environment where NZTA spends 0.7% (!) of their total transport budget on walking AND cycling. If we keep squabbling over what to spend these crumbs on, we are wasting our time. We need to advocate for more spending in general, and public bike schemes are a highly vivisble catalyst for more bike spending - as I said, NextBike alone has created more bike rack funding in the last 2 years than were done in the last 10 years before. Again, that’s just my estimate/guess from being involved along the sidelines, but it shows how it helped cycling. Yes, at the end of the day, money is finite - but we are trying to shift money TO cycling, not divide crumbs given to us from on high.
JC can we leave the “dumb” comments outside?
“I have never heard one visitor ask about where they can hire a bike to ride throughout the city”
There’s numerous Auckland businesses hiring bikes right now, so obviously there is demand for bikes, even though cycling in Auckland has ZERO marketing. And I have taken all my overseas visitors on bike tours around Auckland, and they all loved it.
But that’s a straw man discussion anyway - don’t provide something, no one is going to use it.
In fact, it’s the story of cycling in New Zealand in the last 20-30 years - ignore provision for cycling everywhere, and then argue that because there’s no chickens anymore, obviously eggs aren’t in demand.
“ingolfson – I see the point to point issue – but at the edn of the day – the business case only had 1-2 bike uses per month! and they still failed.”
That comment bugged me - not sure where you have that 1-2 uses from (could you clarify?).
Nextbike has in fact reported that on average, each bike is used for the equivalent of 43 minutes per day. This was blogged on here at AKT a while back. That’s 20plus hours a month, which speaks for more than just 1-2 uses a month. They noted that the usage level was about 1/3rd of Eurpean levels, but much higher than public bike schemes in Australia.
There seems to be a percpetion by some here that NextBike was a failure - ignoring the fact that it was well used, even though it was sorely limited by Council not allowing it to expand to a more survivable level (where the FIXED costs - mainly having two staff members - could actually be borne by advertising and user fees), and with the Council’s transport chairman Ken Baguely loudly putting the future of NextBike in doubt, thus scaring away prospective advertisers
At the same time, even if NextBike had never been able to run on its own without public subsidy (we will never know if they could have managed with a 250 bike fleet they actually had/have in store, instead of the 100-odd they were allowed on teh streets) - how many things in our society require subsidy? There’s public transport (NZTA has officially agreed that nextBike counts as PT, by the way) there’s ROADS (fuel tax doesn’t pay for nearly all our roads budget, especially new roads) and of course there’s the health system (biking is good for reducing those health costs, by the way).
I guess what I am arguing is that people are focusing on an extremely narrow, little subset of things that didn’t quite work yet with the scheme, and missing how this could - did - improve our city. It should be brought back. Not like the London and Paris schemes where a single bike costs the ratepayers many tens of thousands of dollars (!), but in the much more cost-effective way that is fitting to the current cycling levels, but can grow.
Ingolfson,
In my opinion it is a waste of money, and whether I like it all not, as a home owner and rate payer I will end up paying for it.
You wont agree with what I am about to say, however, I would rather see more Auckland rate money go into the building of sporting stadiums and venues in Auckland so we as a city can hold more World Cups, and Elite Sporting Competitions etc etc. Believe it or not, international sports brings into a region huge money. As well as markets our city globally and gives us TV coverage throughout the sporting world as the city to come down and compete in.
Look our sucessful the Lions tour was, America’s Cup, World Cup of Cricket , the Rowing World Cup and the Netball.
If we never had the the Americas Cup, we would have never built the village. And 10 years on it is a Auckland sucess story and a great place to eat and drink.
However what I would support, is a purposed built bikes only cycle circit, from say St Heliers, through to the City and out to West Auckland, - a cycle road something 6-10 meters wide and 100-120 Km’s long, paid for by the Auckland City Council, but paid back by the users of the circit each time they use any part of the track. It could be a cost of 1-2 dollars each time you use the track.
This is the same way public tennis courts, squash courts, rugby grounds cover their cost.
It would also provide bike users a safe protected ride from cars or walkers. Over time, if your comments are true and a lot of people would like to cycle through Auckland, it will paid for itself and the up keep of the track..
ingolfson - the numbers come from their business case - just checked and still on old ACC website - June Transport cmtee.
with 250 bikes they budgeted 500-600 rides per month (300 in winter qtr) ie 2 per month per bike.
I’m just arguing for proper anlaysis. It’s not a simple issue. the racks took up limited space in the historic town centres - and the benefits had to outweigh the negatives. Obviously loss of footpath space - but also their racks were only supposed to be 50% nextbike (they didn’t pay form them) - but they either took all the spots or every second one to maximise advertising exposure - especially on Dominion Rd.
If each bike had been used a couple times a day that would be fine - but they weren’t. Almost none were used in those locations.
I accept you have a users view and that’s fine - but the full case/impacts does need to be considered.
“In my opinion it is a waste of money, and whether I like it all not, as a home owner and rate payer I will end up paying for it.”
At about half a million dollars initial investment, AT/AC could purchase a fleet representing the whole former NextBike system (250 bikes) ONCE A YEAR, at a yearly cost of about 30cents per Aucklander. In response, we’d have a yearly growing set of bicycles for use by everyone. That is not a waste of money, that’s a steal.
But I guess we have to agree to disagree.
JC - sport funding achieves nothing - and is teh classic case of no cost/benefit analysis.
All it does is displace other disposable income spend. And takes it off other businesses. Why fund stadia and not restaurants? it’s the same dispoable $ spend they chase. Put 30,000 people in a stadium, and that takes a lot of money out of the rest of the economy.
The RWC is teh classic over-hyped event - all pushed by peoples who jobs depend on it. The RWC final in Apris was only watched ny $30m people world wide - and over 98% of that was in the major rugby playing countries ie no exposure to any new market. New Zeland has alreday had the same exposure as we’ll get for the RWC from the Hong kong/end of year tour….you’re just paying for exposure to the same people over and over again……just dumb from a NZ Inc point of view - and certainly not worth public funding.
if you want really smart toruism spending - look at $30m for Oprah in Sydney - and that’s just equal to what the NZRU will lose as a best case!
and add the $60-80m Council will spend on RWC….
Mark, the marketing of sport is a huge money earner. Melbourne is the perfect example of this. It is by far the sporting hub throughout Asia/Pacfic.
Having a national stadium on our Auckland water front would have done wonders for Auckland and New Zealand, it is crazy that this was not done.
The up grade of the tennis centre is another good example of money well spent, now the surface is on par with the Melbourne centre, now we will start to get more current big name players down here who bring a raft of followers.
Golf is yet another example of sport marketing NZ, the world cup of Golf held here 8-10 years ago, gave us massive TV coverage throughout the world
Sport as a business investment is a way forward in my opinion. This would have my vote.
Over the last 2 years I have repeatedly offered the council as many racks as they require, including Nextbike stations, for free. Pulling Nextbikes off the streets due to them taking up all of the available racks is just ludicrous. My offer still stands.